A transfer of funds can lag a business transaction, such as a purchase, by many days if a check or other negotiable instrument is used. This is because routing information must be read and processed, and the document must be transferred to a bank for finds to be exchanged. It is advantageous to companies or institutions accepting checks as a form of payment to process those checks as soon as possible after a transaction occurs, so that those companies can obtain and use the funds related to that transaction.
To speed check processing, it can be advantageous to electronically read routing information on checks and also to scan checks or other documents representing a purchase. However, check scanning equipment can be expensive and error prone. Some check scanning systems scan checks multiple times to increase their reliability; however, these systems are generally complex and require additional passes of a scanner element along the document.
For these and other reasons, improvements are desirable.